About Me

Thursday, June 03, 2010

Denim

Check out our adorable cutie in the sweater I knit him! I am so proud of this little sweater; I knit it out of denim yarn, which shrinks in length but not width when washed and dried. This meant I had to do some math and knit it longer than I wanted it to end up, which was especially challenging in the yoke, since this is a raglan sweater (ie, one with diagonal sleeve seams, not a sweater made of rectangles).

Before and after pics:

Before washing: length 15"

After washing: length 13"

It really couldn't have turned out any better, if I do say so myself. I love it!

2 comments:

Nancy
said...

Too cute! I'm impressed you could work out the shrinkage in advance. I have to ask, though: why does a yarn shrink in one direction but not another?!? Being the smallest in my extended family, I inherited a couple of shrunken wool sweaters, and I don't remember them being particularly wide --just really stiff and bulky.

Denim yarn is cotton, and I have no idea why it shrinks only in length, but I suspect it has to do with the knit stitch being more oriented lengthwise than width wise. It's pretty cool. The color is also designed to fade, like a pair of blue jeans (hence denim), so the first time I washed it, I did so with only blue items :-).

Now that I think about it, jeans do sometimes get shorter while still fitting, so I suppose it makes some sense.